FIVE days after Comrade Joe Ajaero, former General Secretary of the Nigerian Union of Electricity Employees, NUEE, and Deputy National President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, made history as the first NLC President to be elected unopposed at the 13th National Delegates Conference in Abuja, on February 8, 2023, I sat down with him in Lagos for an exclusive interview.

Still basking in the euphoria of his victory, he was hopeful and bullish as he discussed the labour movement, what Nigerians should expect of his presidency and the impending 2023 elections. He was analytical and measured.

Declaring that the NLC under his watch will live up to expectations, Ajaero quipped: “I am assuring longsuffering Nigerian workers that I will be their voice. We will cry their cry. We will carry their burden. We will identify with them. If there is any way we have lost touch with the people, we are reconnecting with them. We expect that they will reciprocate. It is not always that we will be on the streets but if there is need for that, we will be on the streets and we are ready to pay the price, no matter how high, to make sure that Nigeria gets better.”

On the impending elections, Ajaero sounded a note of warning: “NLC will work with whoever emerges President in a free and fair poll in the interest of Nigerian workers. But the NLC, under our watch, will not keep quiet in the face of any electoral malpractice. We will not keep quiet in the face of people winning elections and they are not declared winners. We will not keep quiet while rigging becomes the order of the day. The NLC will show more than a passing interest. We want to know how the elections are conducted, how things are done and we want to ensure that things are done well.”

Despite the assurances, I knew that the tenor of Ajaero’s presidency will be significantly impacted by the outcome of presidential election, convinced that any of the four frontline candidates – Bola Tinubu (APC), Atiku Abubakar (PDP), Peter Obi (LP) and Musa Kwankwaso (NNPP) – who wins the election will naturally show more than a passing interest in the affairs of organised labour. But I was convinced that none of them, except Tinubu, will attempt an outright hostile takeover of the labour movement.

Under the watch of Obi, Atiku and even Kwakwanso, NLC will have its usual run-ins with the government which will typically flex muscles but ultimately sit down with the labour leadership for discussions but a Tinubu presidency will be a totally different ball game. Tinubu is one politician with fascist reflexes and takes no prisoners.

The issue of petrol subsidy has always been a volatile matter that galvanises organised labour into action. So, ordinarily, when Tinubu in his inaugural speech thundered that “subsidy is gone,” and the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPCL, subsequently jacked up the pump price of petrol, Nigerian workers would have poured out onto the streets.

Of course, the NLC leadership threatened strike. But the government swiftly swung into action, maximally deploying the devious instrument of ethnic baiting. Joe Ajaero, they lied, is an Obi and possibly Independent People of Biafra, IPOB, sympathiser who wants to call out Nigerian workers in his attempt to subvert the fledgling administration of Tinubu, a Yoruba. Suddenly, a proposed NLC action became an Igbo agenda. It worked. Even before the strike started, almost all the South-West state chapters pulled out. Ajaero, sensing a breakup of the NLC under his watch beat a tactical retreat. The proposed industrial action was called off.

Ajaero assured in our interview that he was ready to pay the price, no matter how high, to make sure that Nigeria gets better. I doubt if he ever imagined how high that price will be in a Tinubu Presidency.

He nearly lost his life when agents of the Imo State government led heavily armed police officers and thugs to abduct him from the Owerri secretariat of the NLC on November 1, 2023. He was mercilessly beaten and blindfolded before they took him away to an unknown destination where he was subjected to indescribable torture. At about 3.30 pm when worried colleagues finally made contacts with him, Ajaero had been severely brutalised and thoroughly humiliated. He was partially blinded and could hardly stand on his feet. The savagery was unconscionable. No other NLC president had been subjected to such demeaning ordeal, not even under military regimes. Till date, the police are yet to make any arrests, not to talk of bringing the pernicious characters who carried out the assault to book.

Then, on Monday, August 19, the Nigeria Police Force bared its fangs accusing Ajaero of committing heinous crimes that include terrorism financing, treasonable felony, subversion and cybercrime. In a letter signed by Adamu Muazu, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Ajaero was ordered to appear before the Intelligence Response Team for interrogation on Tuesday, August 20, at 10 am even as they threatened to activate a warrant of arrest if he fails to honour the invitation.

These are crimes that attract severe punishment on conviction. The least, cybercrime, attracts punishment ranging from three to seven years imprisonment or fine options ranging from N5 million to N10 million; subversion attracts a fine of N5 million or seven years imprisonment; while as terrorism financing is a crime, punishable on conviction, with imprisonment for a term of not less than 20 years. Treason is punishable by death and treasonable felonies are punishable by imprisonment for life.

I doubt if there is any Nigerian that genuinely believes Comrade Joe Ajaero committed these crimes. Police know for sure that these are trumped up charges but they are pushing ahead believing that they will get away, once again, with their continued repression of every alternate voice. The idea is to put Ajaero away, if possible, for a considerable length of time because he is seen as the most potent obstacle to their anti-people policies. The Tinubu administration is busy dismantling all democratic guardrails, a prelude to erecting the pillars of a fascist Nigerian state. It is a patriotic duty to resist him. Sitting in our comfort zones and saying that it is not possible will be a grievous mistake.

Those who accuse Joe Ajaero of not pushing hard enough against the anti-people policies of the administration don’t appreciate what it means to be an NLC President in a Tinubu presidency. It is even worse that Ajaero is Igbo in a country where the presidency has unashamedly elevated the political and cultural polemics of ethnic baiting, racial dog whistles and threats to an art.

Ajaero has deployed wisdom and tact in navigating this very treacherous, uncharted waters. It has been a rather delicate balancing act to ensure that NLC is not splintered by the malevolent forces that are poised to do just that. He should not be vilified.

I have heard some Nigerians make snide remarks, insisting that it serves him right. Such people don’t get it. And to them, the 1946 post-war confessional prose by the German Lutheran pastor, Martin Niemöller, on the silence of German intellectuals and clergy following the Nazis’ rise to power and subsequent incremental purging of their chosen targets, group after group, should be instructive.

First they came for the Communists

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Communist

Then they came for the Socialists

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Socialist

Then they came for the trade unionists

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a trade unionist

Then they came for the Jews

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me

And there was no one left

To speak out for me

Niemöller, an anti-Communist who supported Hitler’s rise to power, an action tantamount to riding on the back of a tiger, got eaten, literally, when he decided to dismount. That is what happens when people prop despots either by their acquiescence or inaction. This is not about Joe Ajaero. It is about the fate of Nigeria’s democracy. Nigerians must resist this bourgeoning fascism before it is too late. It is a patriotic duty.